Do most modern teachers, particularly in western cultures, find it practical or advisable to practice samatha throughout the day? If so, how does one keep from being affected by other people and the environment (in addition to keeping a secluded practice)? If not, why not? Do you find yourself able to react and listen well enough to be an effective, normally functioning person, while doing samatha in daily life?

Just keep breathing in and out like this. Don't be interested in anything else. It doesn't matter even if someone is standing on their head with their ass in the air. Don't pay it any attention. Just stay with the in-breath and the out-breath. Concentrate your awareness on the breath. Just keep doing it. http://www.ajahnchah.org/book/Just_Do_It_1_2.php

---The trouble is that you think you have time------Worry is the Interest, paid in advance, on a debt you may never owe------It's not what happens to you in life that is important ~ it's what you do with it ---

Buddhanussati: contemplation of purity and sanctity of the Buddha assistance given by him to all men.

Metta: exudes a sense of camaraderie and desires that all beings can live happily without exception.

Asubha: ponder bodies belong to themselves and others, that they are basically disgusting.

Maranasati: contemplating death and that death can come at any time.

Four kammatthana should always be developed within each of us.

From: Vinaya Atthakathaa, Satipatthaanna Tiikaa, Visuddhimagga, Buddhasaasn Dictionary by P.A. Payutto--this line is my reference note, isn't origin because P.A. Payutto has change his reference in this message many years ago.

When posting anything in pali please be sure to post the english translation as well as not all our members are fluent in pali. Thank you for your consideration.

The heart of the path is SO simple. No need for long explanations. Give up clinging to love and hate, just rest with things as they are. That is all I do in my own practice. Do not try to become anything. Do not make yourself into anything. Do not be a meditator. Do not become enlightened. When you sit, let it be. When you walk, let it be. Grasp at nothing. Resist nothing. Of course, there are dozens of meditation techniques to develop samadhi and many kinds of vipassana. But it all comes back to this - just let it all be. Step over here where it is cool, out of the battle. - Ajahn Chah

Samatha meditation is not only sitting with eyes closed for a period of time. Samadhi can and should be practiced in all postures and the suttas attest to this. AN 5.29 speaks of the long lasting benefits of samadhi developed through walking meditation and AN 4.41 of the development of concentration through observing the arising and passing of the five aggregates.

As Ajahn Chah said, “If your peace rests on the meditation mat, when you leave the mat you leave your peace behind.”

The heart of the path is SO simple. No need for long explanations. Give up clinging to love and hate, just rest with things as they are. That is all I do in my own practice. Do not try to become anything. Do not make yourself into anything. Do not be a meditator. Do not become enlightened. When you sit, let it be. When you walk, let it be. Grasp at nothing. Resist nothing. Of course, there are dozens of meditation techniques to develop samadhi and many kinds of vipassana. But it all comes back to this - just let it all be. Step over here where it is cool, out of the battle. - Ajahn Chah

It isn't that you only practise meditation in the sitting posture - samadhi means the mind which is firm and unwavering. As you go about your daily life, make the mind firm and steady and maintain this sense of steadiness as the object of mind at all times. You must be practising sati and sampajañña (all round knowing) continuously. After you get up from the formal sitting practice and go about your business - walking, riding in cars and so on - whenever your eyes see a form or your ears hear a sound, maintain awareness. As you experience mind-objects which give rise to liking and disliking, try to consistently maintain awareness of the fact that such mental states are impermanent and uncertain. In this way the mind will remain calm and in a state of 'normality'.

The heart of the path is SO simple. No need for long explanations. Give up clinging to love and hate, just rest with things as they are. That is all I do in my own practice. Do not try to become anything. Do not make yourself into anything. Do not be a meditator. Do not become enlightened. When you sit, let it be. When you walk, let it be. Grasp at nothing. Resist nothing. Of course, there are dozens of meditation techniques to develop samadhi and many kinds of vipassana. But it all comes back to this - just let it all be. Step over here where it is cool, out of the battle. - Ajahn Chah

Just keep breathing in and out like this. Don't be interested in anything else. It doesn't matter even if someone is standing on their head with their ass in the air. Don't pay it any attention. Just stay with the in-breath and the out-breath. Concentrate your awareness on the breath. Just keep doing it. http://www.ajahnchah.org/book/Just_Do_It_1_2.php

I believe that it is important to take meditation into daily life. Don't leave it at the cushion. Practice developing awareness in whatever posture or circumstances you are in and try to not react to negative or useless mental states. Don't prolong bad thoughts or try to destroy them, don't act out on them. This is lifetime of practice right here.

"Life is a struggle. Life will throw curveballs at you, it will humble you, it will attempt to break you down. And just when you think things are starting to look up, life will smack you back down with ruthless indifference..."